The Breadwinner Trilogy (Book 1): The Breadwinner (11 page)

Everyone worked silently and in a matter of minutes, the broken window was replaced by a wall of ‘Pisano’ pizza boxes.  “Let’s go.  They are stupid, but not deaf.”  The stocky man gathered the remaining
cardboard and other bits and pieces of supplies he had brought with him and led the way to the back of the pizzeria.  It was a small parlor, and from the light the lantern cast around the room, it looked exactly as Veronica remembered it from the last time she ate here.  Minus the broken glass and garbage all over the place.  Two red booth seats with white tables lined the walls on either side and a large table, which had been in the middle, was lying on its side near the back door to the kitchen.  They were ushered past the counter and through the kitchen door by the petite woman who stayed in the front parlor.  Through the now closed door Veronica heard the table being pushed up against it and saw the woman’s head appear as she crawled through the drop window over the counter to join the rest of them in the kitchen.

The smell hit Isaac first as he began to cough and gag.  Veronica’s eyes watered and she brought her shirt up over her face and held it there.  The woman shushed them and pushed them forward into the darkness of a small foyer.  The tall man had already vanished up the stairs and the stocky man held the door open for the rest as Isaac, followed by Veronica slowly crept up the stairs.  The petite woman closed and locked the first door and joined them on the steps while the stocky man secured the door he had been holding.  The stairs led to a small living room with a large sectional sofa and lazy boy off to the side.  An unused flat screen television was mounted to the wall, underneath it, a plethora of dead electronics.

The tall man was seated in the lazy boy, feet propped up, gun in his lap.  This room had two more lanterns, one in his corner, and one under the TV.  The petite woman shut hers off and set it near the couch as she sat down, ringing her hands, looking back and forth from the tall man to the stocky man, as if she was waiting her turn to speak.  “My name is Salvador Roja.”  The stocky man spoke first.  He motioned to the small woman on the couch, “This is my wife, Lucy.”

“You own the pizzeria.”  Isaac recognized the name instantly. 

“That’s right.”  Salvador nodded, “did you used to come here?”

“Well yeah, but, I know who your son his.  He plays football for Franklin.  My school’s rival.”  He seemed pleased with himself but his face instantly went grim when a small squeak escaped Lucy’s mouth and she pursed her lips.  Salvador placed a hand on his wife’s shoulder.

“We have lost our son.”  He looked down at his wife whose face rested on his hand.

“I’m uh, really sorry.  I wasn’t thinking.”  Isaac turned his face down, embarrassed.

“It is alright, you couldn’t have known.”  Lucy spoke finally, wiping her eyes on her hands.  She also had an accent, but slightly lighter than her husband’s.  “He was a good boy, I’m glad that you knew of him.”

“My name is Isaac, this is my sister, Veronica.”  Veronica nodded a greeting.

“This is-“ Salvador began to introduce the tall man but he was cut off.

“I’m just Ben.  Nothin’ fancy.”  The tall man put his feet down and leaned forward, elbows on his knees.  “I rent this apartment from Sal, I managed his kitchen, now it’s a bathroom.”  Ben looked at Sal and they both shrugged.  “Sorry buddy.”

“Shit happens, yeah?”  Sal responded, pleased with his quick wit.

Ben smiled, appreciating the humor, and gave him a thumbs up with one hand as he lit a cigarette with another.  He got up from his lazy boy and retrieved an ashtray from the shelf under the wall mounted TV set.  He sat back down, silent for a moment, staring at Isaac as if trying to figure him out.  Isaac averted his intimidating stare.  “Well, go on then.  Let’s get the story swapping out of the way.  It’s inevitable and I’d rather be depressed now than later.”  Ben said, looking at Veronica.  He leaned back in the lazy boy and propped his feet back up.  Closing his eyes, he waited for someone to start telling their version of the same miserable tale that inevitably led them all to his apartment.

VIII

Sal (as he was called by friends) and Lucy lived with their son in Franklin Woods, an upscale community outside the city and not far from the beautiful Paradise Bay.  He made a living flipping restaurants that were going out of business and growing them into something they never could have been without him.  He could take any other man’s trash and turn it into his own treasure.  He was a charismatic business man with three different degrees and Lucy was a pharmacist.  Their son Marco was the model son; perfect grades, amazing athlete and helped out in the community.   He was to graduate this year and go on to Florida State University on a full football scholarship.  Salvador had been on his way home after stopping by to check on a few of his eateries when everything started going to shit.  He made sure the places were secure, that there was nothing of importance to loot inside, he had no idea how long it would be until he came back once he left the crumb
ling city.  His phone rang and Lucy was in a panic on the other end.  

“People started attacking each other in the parking lot, I had to leave and now I can’t get home!”  Sal pulled his phone back away from his ear and shook his head.

“Mama, lower your voice.  Where are you right now?”  Sal maneuvered through the city streets, dodging people and cars in his Lincoln Navigator as he spoke to his wife. 

“I turned around before even getting on the highway when I noticed traffic wasn’t moving on the bridge.  What am I supposed to do?  Where are you?” 

“Panicking is not going to help, especially if you are driving.”  Sal slammed on his brakes.  A man stopped dead in his tracks for a mere moment in front of the truck and briefly locked eyes with Sal.  It looked as if the man was saying something to him but the screaming of two crazy eyed women interrupted him and he took off running again.  Sal contemplated following them but figured he better let the police handle looters and started driving again.

“Salvador!”  Lucy screamed through the phone, he had forgotten he was talking to her.

“Ok!  Yeah!  Listen, you’re going to end up hitting somebody, I don’t need my insurance premiums any higher than they are now.”  He pulled up in front of Pisano’s Pizzeria and turned his Navigator off.  The street seemed pretty clear in comparison to what he had just driven through.  “I just got to the pizzeria.  Meet me here, we’ll figure it out then.”

Sal opened the truck’s door and stepped out, looking around.  People were running crazily down the other end of the street and Sal didn’t like the looks of it.  He locked and set the alarm on his vehicle and hurried inside.    A few other employees were holed up with Ben at the pizzeria when he arrived. 

Lucy called her son frantically but was unable to get a call through as she broke every traffic law imaginable, getting to Pisano’s in record time.  Her BMW ran up on the curb and smashed into a few garbage cans, sending them clattering in different directions.  She nervously fumbled with gathering her things from the backseat and got out.  Lucy didn’t even bother locking her 760Li.  The air was alive with noise and a strange yet still man eerily watched her from the corner.  She sprinted across the street and the running must have sparked the man’s attention because he was now snarling and rushing down the sidewalk in her direction.  The door to the pizzeria burst open and Ben ushered her inside and into Sal’s arms.  By the time Ben had bolted the heavy oak door shut the man was already pounding on it.  Everyone inside starting screaming and Ben shouted for them all to “shut the fuck up.”  He ran to the counter and pulled his magnum from under the register and started back toward the door.  Sal thought about stopping him but let him go.  He knew the door wouldn’t give, but what about the huge window when the crazy guy figured out he could just kick that in? 

When Ben pulled the door open the man seemed to fly at him from the pavement, growling, teeth gnashing.  Ben grabbed the man by the throat and threw him to the sidewalk, warning him to stay down.  When the man didn’t listen and got back to his feet Ben shot him in the leg, but the man remained standing and again lunged at Ben, completely unfazed by the bullet hole in his leg.  Ben had never been more shocked in his life, even after spending three years in the desert and nearly dying out there, he’d never seen a man take a bullet like that.  Once more he grabbed the man and threw him to the ground, but this time he noticed the glaze over his eyes and the strange wound he had on his scalp, almost like a bite mark.  The man attempted to get up again but Ben slammed his boot into his chest.  The man writhed and growled under Ben’s weight, arms and legs flailing as he tried to throw him off.  Ben leaned in to get a closer look at the bite on the guy’s scalp.  A chunk of hair and flesh was missing, dried blood was crusted all around the wound and the wound itself appeared to be black in color.  The smell emanating from the man was the smell of death; Ben was all too familiar with the smell and decided he’d seen enough.  Without releasing the man from under his big, booted foot, he raised his gun and put a bullet in his head.   He looked around, seeing if the noise had attracted any attention but luckily for him there seemed to be fire trucks with their sirens blaring on the next street over.   He rushed back into the pizzeria after dragging the body around Sal’s Lincoln and leaving it in the street. 

Ben and Sal spoke in hushed voices near the door once it was secure.  They agreed on covering the storefront window and securing everyone in the kitchen.  Lucy switched the small television set in the kitchen on to the news but the information was all emergency instructions to stay in side and isolate yourself from those who exhibited signs of illness.  Two of the female employees sat huddled together weeping near the freezer and a male employee nervously paced behind Lucy.  Sal’s cell phone rang on the counter and startled everyone.   Lucy ran to it and read the name across the screen.  Marco.

“Sal!”  Her voice echoed through the pizzeria and Sal rushed into the kitchen followed by Ben. 

Lucy put the cell phone on speaker mode.  “Mijo!”  Lucy squealed into the phone.

“Hey!”  Sal couldn’t help but be overjoyed and joined his wife on the phone.

“Ma?!  You guys?!”  Marco’s voice crackled through the speaker, he sounded elated.  “You guys are alright?”

“Yeah yeah, we are fine, where are you?”  Sal asked his son.

Marco told them he was stuck in traffic just a couple miles from the house, traffic on the highway was at a standstill.  “Look, I’m with some friends, they’ll probably need to stay at the house, there’s no way that anybody is getting back into the city.  It’s crazy out here!”  The reception of the call was terrible and it was a miracle it had even gone through in the first place.

“Listen to me.”  Sal’s voice became very stern.  “If you are not that far from the house I think you need to get out and walk.”  Marco responded but his voice was too warbled to make out what he said.  Lucy began to cry and Sal hushed her quickly.  “Marco?  You still there?”

“Yeah, I don’t know if I want to walk.  The radio is saying crazy things, I have no idea what’s going on, people are just going nuts man.”

“Marco you need to get off the highway, you need to get away from all those other people on the roads!”  Another voice was heard through the speaker, one of Marco’s friends in the car.

“What..going…ahead.”  The voice was very broken up.  “Dad?  Something is wrong.”

“Marco?  What is it baby?”  Lucy was in full on panic mode, her hands were shaking, her lip quivering.

Marco’s friends started yelling in the car.  Lucy and Sal were screaming, demanding he tell them what was going on.  Marco’s voice was full of panic as he explained that people were getting out of their cars and running, some people were jumping off the bridge, others were attacking each other.  It wasn’t helping that the call quality had dropped by probably 60%.  Marco began yelling and cursing, they heard someone say that they needed to get out of the car.  Screams of horror, guttural growls and dead silence immediately followed.  They never heard from their son again.

“No one could have known how bad it was about to get.”  Sal had told them as he finished reliving the events that had stranded them at Pisano’s.  Sal looked at his wife who was wiping tears from her eyes; he put his arm around her shoulder and everyone sat quietly by the lantern light.

IX

Ben seemed to be in another world, staring at the ceiling, chain smoking in the recliner.  His story was completely opposite everyone else’s.  It was short and to the point.  He joined the military right out of high school and spent most of his time overseas.  He was wounded in Afghanistan and honorably discharged.  “Pretty uneventful life until people started eatin’ each other, but then again, I’d rather deal with this nightmare than ever spend another fucking night in that God forsaken sand pit,” he explained.  He rolled his cigarette around between his fingers before putting it out and sitting up to place the ashtray on the floor.  “No family, not a whole lotta friends.  Mostly everybody I cared about died in the fuckin’ place I miraculously came back from and so I’d say I don’t have a whole lot to lose.  Sal gave a good ol’ boy a job and a place to live and here we are.”  He cracked his knuckles and spread his arms, motioning to everyone.  “Too bad we don’t have any damn tea and biscuits.” 

Everyone remained where they were for some time; Ben on the recliner, Sal by his wife’s side on the couch, Veronica and Isaac on the floor.  Veronica had calmly explained that they had lost their father, could no longer stay in their home and tried to make their way out of the city.  Sal and Ben remained pleasantly distant while Lucy was very hospitable, offering them water and food, but neither sibling wanted for anything. 

A few hours passed and Veronica figured everyone to be asleep.  Ben told Lucy to get the kids something to sleep on and it was almost as if Isaac had passed out before his head even hit the pillow.  Sal and Lucy lay motionless on the pullout couch and Ben had gone off to his bedroom.  She crept around the apartment, trying to get a feel for everything.  All the windows in the living room and kitchen had been covered in the same fashion as the downstairs storefront.  If the eaters didn’t recognize light, that was one thing, Lucy had told them earlier, but not all people out there would be as nice as the people her and her brother had so luckily stumbled upon.  There was not too much for Veronica to explore in the tiny apartment, there was only a small hallway off the kitchen with two closed doors.  She assumed the one at the end of the hall was a bedroom and ignored it.  She opened the other door very slowly and stepped into a small bathroom with a square uncovered window.  Her breath caught in her throat as she gazed at the beauty of the full moon.  It was as if someone had strategically placed it there, in the middle of the window frame just for her to see.  There was just enough light from it for her eyes to adjust to the small room.  No one had been using the bathroom here, thankfully.  She pressed her face up against the glass, it was cool.  The only thing she could see clearly was the roof of the building across the small alley way.  Finally alone, she felt herself wanting to cry, wanting to give in to the grief she felt for her father, her brother, Sal and Lucy and Marco.  For anyone else who had lost someone or been lost, which at this point she figured she should be grieving for the whole world.  She asked herself how long they could really stay here, how safe creeping around like blind mice in an attic really was.  She felt movement behind her and went for the kitchen knife in her waistband as she spun around.

“No need for that.”  Ben whispered.  “Do you like sneakin’ around people’s houses at night?”  Veronica shook her head no, stepping away from the window nervously.  Ben pointed to the closed lid on the toilet, “Have a seat if you’d like.”  He closed the door behind him as she sat and he quietly inched the window open.  She crinkled her nose at the smell of decay that had begun to creep in.  “You’ll get used to it.”  He told her as he sat down across from her on the ledge of the tub.

“Do you mind?”  He held out an open palm with a rolled joint.  She shrugged and stared up at the moon again.  “Help isn’t coming, you know?”  He took a long drag off the joint, “I had a guy I talked to right before the phones went out, still in the service.  He said things were worse than
a war zone in the bigger cities and not to expect any help any time soon.”

“I wasn’t thinking there would be any help.”

“Smart girl.”  He smiled to himself and offered her a hit of the joint. 

“I don’t like to.”  She remembered the sense of restriction she felt when she smoked a blunt with some friends from school last year, the feeling of unease it gave her, while everyone around her laughed and felt free, she felt trapped and anxious.  Dee had told her to loosen up and it would get better, but it never did.

Ben laughed, coughing, trying to remain as quiet as possible.  “An even smarter girl.”  Veronica felt her face grow hot and was thankful there was no light in the bathroom for him to notice her blush.  “What makes you think it’s ok to sneak around like this anyway?”

“I wasn’t,” she answered, too quickly, and bit her lip sheepishly.  “I just, um, wanted to be alone.”

He nodded, looking up at the window, “Sorry for the intrusion.” 

They continued to talk casually in the tiny bathroom while Ben secretly got high.  Veronica found herself wondering how old Ben was and then cursed herself, chasing the thoughts of a normal 16 year old girl out of her head.  He asked what her and Isaac’s plans were and where they were heading when Isaac was attacked.

“Well, like I told ya’ll earlier, we don’t have much of a plan.  But we really want to get to the water.  You know, if we can’t find safety there, like maybe with a boat or something, then maybe we can work our way along the coast.”  She twirled a strand of dark hair on her finger and stared down at her feet.  “I promised my dad we’d head that way.  There aren’t a lot of people by the water.”

Ben perked up at her last statement.  “Well you must get your smarts from your old man.”  She looked up at Ben, surprised by his approval.  “This time of year, the tourists don’t bother us no more and the Canadians haven’t decided to migrate south just yet.”  He chuckled, “I can’t believe I didn’t ever think of that.”  He put out the joint and put it in his pocket.  “I guess I’ll admit that I just haven’t really wanted to leave.  We had a couple other people here with us just yesterday.  Can you believe it?  Couple of employees, but they didn’t want to stay.  They wanted to try and make it home to their families.  I mean, I get it, but after the conversation between Marco and his parents, I wasn’t too keen on goin’ anywhere.  They shouldn’t have been either.”

“Do you know what happened to them?”

“Nah, I’d rather not think about it.  Those two girls were dumb as bricks under normal circumstances so I can’t imagine them keepin’ their shit together out there in a time like this, cryin’ over every damn thing. 
It was Roger’s idea to leave, I just think he wanted to play the hero and get laid by tweedle dumb and tweedle dee, but ya know, it’s just not my place to say.”

Veronica couldn’t help but giggle.  Under different circumstances she might have been put off by his honesty, but right now she felt comforted by it.  Ben smiled, “So how about we sit down and have a discussion tomorrow about headin’ to the bay?”

Veronica liked the idea of Ben coming, especially since it was probably safe to assume he could handle himself and keep them out of trouble.  But she couldn’t help but to be wary of going out there in a group like this.  Would they be able to move fast enough, quietly enough?  She knew that she could out run anything, and Isaac wasn’t far behind her in that talent.  But what about Sal and Lucy?  Lucy seemed like the loose end of the group.  Sure, she could hold it together with four walls surrounding her, but what happens when a group of eaters are biting at her heels?

Ben noticed Veronica had yet to respond and could just barely make out her facial expression enough to see she was worrying.  “Listen,” he got up from his seat on the tub and stretched.  “Get some sleep girl, and tomorrow, if you want to talk about your plan with everyone, you talk about it.”  He pretended to lock his mouth and throw away the key.  She managed another smile as he closed the window back up and left her to her thoughts on the toilet.

X

Isaac stirred the following morning, his body aching from sleeping on the floor.  He thought of his bed, back in the place that used to be his home followed by thoughts of an Eliza he’d never again see.  Then he thought of his father’s body lying on the floor in the place where Veronica put a knife through his skull.  He blinked his eyes a couple of times and sat up.  Everyone was awake and in the kitchen from what he could tell except for him and his sister.  Veronica was sound asleep on the couch.  He went about tidying his make shift bed up and placed everything in the corner near the lantern. 

“Good morning,” Lucy greeted him as she came back into the living room, “I have some coffee here, it isn’t very good though.”  Her smile was warm; she had nice soft features on a small face that was framed with thick black hair cut in a fashionable bob.  Sal on the other hand had a thick dark beard, small sharp eyes and was balding. 

“Thank you,” Isaac nodded and took the cup.  It was bitter and cold. 

“More like instant shit than instant coffee, wouldn’t you agree?”  Ben said to him without looking up as he entered the kitchen. 

“It’s just fine.”  Isaac lied and smiled at Lucy.  “Thanks.”  There was a plate of something on the table next to some untoasted English muffins. 

“Canned breakfast meat.  It is also cold, I’m sorry.”  Lucy told him as she noticed him eyeing the plate.  “Not much we can do since the power went out.”

Isaac smiled at her again, “That’s just fine, I understand.”  He took a seat in the empty chair and made himself a makeshift breakfast sandwich.  The table didn’t match the chairs and it seemed the whole kitchen was mismatched, which although he didn’t know him very well at all, Isaac figured it to be the appropriate kitchen for someone like Ben.  Sal sat silently across from Isaac, reading an out of date newspaper.  He wondered if Sal had memorized it yet, imagining him sitting in the same spot each morning, reading the same headlines and articles over and over again.  Ben stood smoking a cigarette over the sink, staring out an open window that had been covered up the night before. 

“I thought you guys kept the windows covered up?”  Isaac asked through a mouthful of tasteless food.

“This one overlooks the alley out back of the building, no light to be seen during the day anyway.”  Ben put a cigarette out in the sink, never breaking his stare out the window.

“Anything interesting out there?”

“Interesting?  Yeah, could be.” 

Ben’s answer surprised him.  “What do you mean?”

“Few days ago we heard some screamin’, but not the kind of screamin’ we had been hearing.”  He lit up another cigarette and looked at Isaac.  “Like the kind you used to hear before all this.  When it was just regular ol’ people treatin’ other people like shit.  Ya know, robbin’ from people or maybe somethin’ worse.  But anyway, what I’m thinking is that if they found out we were in here, well, you know how that might go.”

Isaac swallowed his food hard.  “Yeah, I probably wouldn’t wanna find out.”

“So I’m just attempting to see them first.”

Sal snorted behind his newspaper.  “Paranoia.  Stop smoking all that mota man.”  Ben chuckled and flipped him off.